Thursday, January 22, 2009

Lavender grows in containers or in the garden (above, my Manhattan rooftop).

It’s a tastyculinary herb,has a delight-ful aromawhich some sayreduces stress.(right, lavenderMadeleines.One plant pro-duces enoughbuds for a fullyear of home baking.

It’s excellent as a cut flower,both fresh and dried.(Right,lavender spiral topiarywith dried larkspur, globethistle, et al). Select hardy ortender species with flowerpower from deepestpurple, lilac, pink and white.I'll be starting two newvarieties from Renee'sGarden Seeds on mywindowsill in early March.Plants will probably bloomthe first season from seed.

Doesn’t that sound like theperfect plant for New York?Granted it needs full sun,but to balance that one re-striction, it repels deershould you have any on yourbalcony, fire escape, roof-top, or Brooklyn backyard,and it’s a perfect perennialfor an organic gardenerbecause it needs no sprayand little fertilizer.

Learn all about it in theNEW edition of my lavenderbook, hot off the presses,'Lavender:How to Grow &Use the Fragrant Herb', 2nded. Stackpole Books 2009.Purchase signed copy at my website or unsigned fromyour favorite bookseller.

Visit one of the lavender fairs and festivals described in the book, a treat for both gardeners and non-gardeners who will appreciate the tastes, music and aromas of an agricultural party. No need to go to Provence to see the real thing, try the US and Canada and you’ll be amazed.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

So imagine my delight when after trudging uphill, through snow that quickly overwhelmed my woefully inadequate suede shoes, I opened the door to my client's greenhouse and found:

The misters were spraying, the air was humid and moist, and just for a moment I was transported to a kinder, gentler place. I call that place Riverdale.

Sadly I didn't have my camera with me...only a cell phone, but I did what I could to convey the lush tropical beauty I found in the middle of the Bronx. The Phalanopsis orchids are blooming like crazy, along with a fragrant Dendrobium 'Aussie Chip' and a highly scented Zygopetalum.

I stripped down to my undershirt (hey, no one else was there!) and got to work pruning, deadheading, and watering.It was well below freezing outside, but warm enough in the greenhouse to work up a sweat.

No tropical vacation for me this year, but an hour or so in the greenhouse, peeking out from underneath the Australian tree fern, goes a long way toward relieving that New York City stress.

Saturday, January 10, 2009

Living wall, green wall, vertical garden, Le Mur Vegetal: they’re all names for a new type of garden design rapidly gaining respect. Pioneered by Patrick Blanc in Paris in 1994 vertical gardens are popping up on façades when there's no other room to plant. Green walls are akin to greenroofs, but run vertically, often in a place where passers by can admire them, sometimes on an interior wall.

The structure requires plastic sheeting, a metal frame, and fibrous materialsto hold the roots in place. There is no soil. Plants are watered from the topwith a carefully metered solution of water and nutrients. This mix tricklesdown; excess is captured in a trough at the bottom, then returned to the topto reuse. Interior green walls need special lighting as well.

Eager to see an example andnot ready to spring for a tripto Paris where I could see atleast six gardens designed byBlanc, I hoofed it to E. 86th St.,between 3rd and 2nd Ave. inManhattan. My eye wastemporarily distracted by afruit stand at curbside. I walk-ed right by the garden, whichreaches from the second tothird floors above the PureYoga Studio. If you look onlyin the storefronts, or at thestrawberries on the cart,you’ll miss it.

On this heavily commercial block, the garden makes an aesthetic statement, and a small contribution to reducing air pollution spewed out by trucks and the crosstown bus. I took some pictures but decided to wait until spring to write about it, tracking the stability of the garden through two more seasons.Alas, on my visit last week'scaffolding scourge' had over-taken the garden. By law,facades of New York City build-ings over six stories must be inspected “periodically”. Once a company comes to inspect and make repairs, the scaffolding remains FOREVER. The plants were totally shielded from sunlight except for a small band above the construction. They looked ratty,if not dead.

So beware if you hope to installa vertical garden: check out yourbuilding’s plans before you start,or try this small scale version ofa green wall in any limited space.(As seen at the New York Botanic Garden Home Gardening section).

Monday, January 5, 2009

The most frequent question I get as a houseplant expert is "What's the best plant for a room with no light?" Ok, if your room really has NO light, your best bet is plastic. But if what you actually have is LOW light, then here are my Top Five:

6) Fittonia verschaffeltii (snakeskin plant)(Yes, I know I said five...you're complaining about a bonus?!)This plant grows to be about 6-8" tall. It keeps its color in indirect light or under fluorescents. Variegation can be white or pink. Don't let it dry out; it's a dramatic flopper.

5) Philodendron selloum (cut leaf philodendron)This plant is a living sculpture and deserves a better photograph. It flourishes in a bright northern window and if your northern window isn't bright, it will still put on a decent show. P. selloum gets big: 2' tall x 2' wide.

4) Ficus pumila (creeping fig)This petite beauty grows well in dim light and under fluorescents. It climbs freely and can be trained onto a topiary form if you're into that. (Guess how I feel about it.)

3) Sansevieria trifasciata (snake plant)I won't listen to a bad word about this plant! If you don't like it, it's because you haven't seen it used properly and grown well. This plant is a trouper: it's sturdy, architectural, 2-3' tall, and if you keep it on the dry side it grows well in very low light.

I’m a woman of a certain age, a grandma, dignified, polite, law-abiding. You wouldn’t think I’d go dumpster diving. You’d be wrong.Stepping off the number 10 bus on Central Park West, minding my own business, I spied a woman throwing a large flower arrangement in the corner trashcan. It had probably once decorated the lobby of a grand apartment building. Like catnip to a cat, it lured me. There among the browning Star-gazer lilies, the limp roses and the curling callas, were five gorgeous stems of blue hydrangea, mature and crisp and just ready to complete their drying in my warm livingroom. For the result, see above.

Philadelphia where I grew up, was a proper city with alleyways behindhouses. Residents put out their garbage cans in the back, and truckscould drive down, grab the garbage, all properly hidden from street life.New York isn’t so dignified and mountains of plastic bags with bothgarbage and recycling form on front curbs several times a week.The great part of this system is that people display their larger itemsand reusables for all to see. No need for FreeCycle.com. Two years agoI snagged a fabulous green metal chair sans seat, to serve both as plantstand and trellis for a climbing Hoya in a containerized succulent garden.It’s still serving with honor on my rooftop. (above, center)

Last spring a storm pruned large limbs of a flowering pear on Second Ave.Rushing to make a meeting, I had enough time to snap off some piecesand stuff themin my ever-present canvasbag. Later athome I clippedthe stems andwatched thebuds bloom intepid water.

My New Years Eve gift below. See the explanation in my comment to Judy Lowe, at the bottom of the post SHOWOFF on 12/29/08.

Friday, January 2, 2009

In case you haven't noticed, Other Ellen is very crafty. Give her a few foraged birch branches and voila! You've got art.

I'm not quite as aesthetically oriented...any creative energy I have left over after a hard day's work is devoted to investigating, preparing, and eating interesting food. Fortunately, I live in NYC where there's no shortage of interesting food. And some of the most unusual raw ingredients are free for the picking.

This time of year there isn't a lot to forage, but today I opened a bottle of homemade wine made from Japanese knotweed (Polygonum cuspidatum aka Fallopia japonica) harvested in Central Park last April. Let me warn you, what I'm describing is illegal; you're breaking the law by removing any vegetation from NYC parks. I don't understand why, since knotweed is rampantly invasive and the USDA's National Invasive Species Information Center ranks it as a highly noxious weed.

Knotweed is a good beginner's wine for several reasons: It's ready to drink approximately 6 months after bottling (this is fast in wine-making time), it's tasty, and the raw materials are very plentiful. You'll find it growing in vacant lots all over the five boroughs, in addition to the aforementioned, off-limits parks!

Choose unbranched spears, between eight and 16 inches tall. They may be as thick as your thumb or as slim as a pencil. You can snap them off at ground level, but a pair of pruners speeds the harvest. In 15 minutes you can easily pick the 3 pounds needed for a batch of wine.